Amazing how angry people are over being forced to use another launcher to play their games.

Same difference. You point still boils down to "it's already happening anyway, so let's excuse Epic for their flaw instead of pointing them out." I repeat, there can be no excuses. Flaws need to be pointed out, because they are objectively flaws, and if they are not pointed out, there is no incentive to improve.

Look at them Steamers getting steamed because of Epic exclusives. :P

@madrocketeer: it’s not the same.

No one was worried or bitched about it before now.

It’s only bc it’s a new store on PC and Epic is doing exclusive deals which makes PC gamers have to do more than only open Steam to play games.

It’s too much for hermits to handle...I get it.

But saying the Chinese are spying on us is old...not new if we’re using the logic we’re using.

Better late than never. A flaw is a flaw, doesn't matter the method or the context in which it was revealed. There. Can. Be. No. Excuses.

And please point to a single instance in any of my posts where I have personally mentioned the Chinese. In fact, I consider the whole "Chinese spyware" conspiracy to be bonkers at best, and unintentionally doing Epic a favour at worst. This issue is, first on foremost, on Epic. Blaming the Chinese siphons responsibility away from the ones most immediately responsible, namely Epic themselves.

Your ignorance is not an argument

Delusional nonsense to make a pathetic attempt at mocking a group of people pulled from the mind of a console only loser

stfu jim sterling

Not only that but Discord offers 90/10% split. Yet hardly any games are exclusive to the Discord Store or even on it even though it has large userbase of 250 million currently and in mid 2018 130 million users with 8.2 million concurrent users a day and 19 million people using it on a daily basis.

Let's be real this isn't really about percentage cuts but the easy money Epic is handing out to devs because Epic doesn't just pay for it to be a exclusive for a year but also any "guaranteed" lose sales from not releasing on Steam and elsewhere during that year. So they get a ton of money upfront and more later. Because of that it makes it really easy for devs and pubs especially indie devs to jump on the Epic Store train because they have a golden parachute.

I have yet to see any dev or publisher that wasn't paid off by Epic talk about how good and great the store is and more importantly how copies have they sold on the store than they did on Steam, GOG and other stores. Until then I believe this really ain't about percentage cuts but the easy money Epic is giving out.

Thanks for that info, another big reason to put on my list to never buy something from Epic games store!

I'll grab their free games, but that will be as far as my transactions with Epic go.

Remember the days when Epic was a company creating game engines and now 20 some years later they are now running a game store .

Epic does have the Mega/Unreal Dev grant but the money given for that isn't near the amount they're giving for games to be exclusive to their store. The most you'll get from a Mega grant is $500,000 with the lowest reward being $5,000. Meanwhile Epic will pay $2 million upfront for games such as Phoenix Point to be exclusive and this isn't including the money they'll give for loss of sales from not being on Steam and GOG so very likely at least another million as well later.

All this Epic Store controversy is starting to make people remember Epic's bad past with PC gaming. The duality between Valve and Epic is huge. Valve didn't believe that PC gaming was dying and destroying the industry through piracy. Gabe Newell stated it was a service issue and not a piracy one thus he went on to make Steam a convenient platform for both players and devs as a result Steam is the most used and preferred platform on PC and PC gaming is better than ever no longer being a far after thought by most developers and publishers. Epic Games abandoned the PC platform in a heart beat and even blamed rampant piracy on affecting their console sales of games and stated that they and no one else should bother developing for PC. Epic releases their own store and it's a hot mess but instead of quickly fixing that they try to strong arm the market by paying for exclusives and all their actions are doing is locking games to a incredibly subpar platform which makes people want to pirate again.

All the Gears Of War games could have been ported to PC as it was Epic's choice but they chose not to release them on PC because they thought it was a dead platform and PC piracy possibly impact Xbox 360 version sales. Gears Of War was also originally going to be the next Unreal game as an Xbox 360 exclusive but they scratched that and went with Gears Of War but decided to reuse some things which is why Unreal Tournament 3 looks a lot like Gears Of War. Epic blamed piracy for both those games not selling as much on Xbox 360 as PC even though Unreal Tournament 3 was the worst in the series and Games For Windows Live was horrible platform. They were released in the same time frame as Crysis, COD Modern Warfare, STALKER SOC and The Orange Box.

When the Epic Store was first announced I was actually glad because I thought it would give Steam some good competition but now it in its current state it's just a cancer to PC gaming likely bringing back the pirate era that made Epic Games want to abandon PC in the first place. Epic learned nothing from Valve and Steam but instead Microsoft and Xbox so they decided to bring their console exclusivity war crap to PC. Epic are taking it even further as they recently stated they'll even buy out games that are already on Steam!

@PinchySkree: I also own a PC and over a hundred games on Steam alone, but please continue being butthurt. ?

Lmao what, there are zero negatives in reality. I don't see any issue with multiple launchers, as long as PC remains first place by a large margin each gen.

It's not my fault some of my fellow hermits don't get how competition, the free market, and capitalism work.

Boot up? It take 1-2 seconds to open those up.

Opening up every launcher combined is still faster than turning on XB or PS.

We are well aware that you admit PC won this gen and last gen, Givoela.

@zaryia: Let's start a bidding war where Epic/Valve pay for exclusivity on games we would otherwise get on multiple stores, using money that could otherwise be spent on improving services/funding games. All to do nothing but inconvenience the paying customer.

The joys of capitalism and competition :P.

Personally, I'll buy it if it's the only place to play the games, but I understand why some gamers don't want to be involved.

Luckily, I have yet to spend any money in the Epic store, but that will likely change in the future if they keep up the bribery crap.

If I can play the games I bought then I don't give a shit about any of the other crap.

No they don't. PC is up by over 100 titles at GS and MC over the second best system. A guy banging hot chicks all week doesn't suddenly stop wanting more.

Reported.

Your words, not mine. It's not my fault PC objectively won this gen.

• First place at SW (GS) AAA and AA, by far. This is not even counting emulation.
• Best version of nearly all video games on top of exclusive genres.
• First place GFX and FPS, by far.
• First place MP and E-sports, by far.

I love Epic store. Mostly because of how upset it makes PC gamers.

I hope it thrives and makes a ton of money.

If only to continue pissing off pc gamers who want to only ever shop at one store for the rest of their lives.

You need other people to suffer to make yourself feel better, noted

With the rest of the console only misery, you ignore all the facts and bleet the it's just one more launcher nonsense, followed by a made up garbage claim about what PC gamers do or think

@zaryia: Oh no you reported my post for hurting your wittle feelings. ????

Maybe if this was the wannabe NeoGaf GameSpot of ten years ago that would mean something. ??‍♂️?

You can spam all the irrelevant scores and spreadsheets you want but it doesn't change the fact that at the end of the day, hermits don't buy games. They'll review bomb and down vote endless youtube videos but will they ever buy a game? Never. When even PC darlings like TW3 sell twice as much on the PS4 alone despite launching with egregious issues, then it's not hard to see why developers are opting to go EGS exclusive.

Stay salty, hermit.?

Lack of choice on a system drives up individual game sales

And it didn't sell twice as much on the PS4. The PS4 version in the first year made up 48% of copies sold while the PC made up 31%. After the first year PC takes the lead in sales as the console versions continue to drop. The PC version is most likely the most profitable version as a large amount of copies of The Witcher 3 were bought through GOG which CD Projekt owns so they get 100% of the money from each sale there. Before Rockman999 tries to damage control by saying people on PC were buying it for $5, during that time of 2015-2017 period the cheapest The Witcher 3 ever got on sale was $20 and that is not including the DLC too.

Hermits don't buy games which is why Capcom is impressed that the sales ratio of the PC versions of their games is increasing and the platform is now a big priority for them. Or why Kingdom Come: Deliverance sold more on PC than consoles combined. Or how Risk Of Rain 2 just quietly gets released on Steam and within a week sells half a million copies.

@Rockman999: You need to buy a game on steam to review it. Hermits can't review bomb a game without buying it lol.

Hmmmm......perhaps when Epic doesn’t feel entitled to selling my private information sans my consent I won’t feel so entitled to prefer a service that doesn’t do so, yes?

I could care less what it is offered on as long as I can play it.

Well, I don't know what the statistics are about how much those features are used but personally I pretty much just use steam to buy and play games.

Consoles have been playing the "exclusive" game for years - pc may as well do it to. And it's not like you have to pay to get access to exclusives with pc (unlike consoles where you have to buy separate devices).

In the end the market will decide.

Not unless they need updates.

@GarGx1: really? Am I to understand you pirated metro? You're lucky there are more dumber herms that bought the game or the next metro might be bone exclusive.

No, for using insults involving mentally challenged individuals. Making fun of the Special Olympics is astonishing, I guess this is what PS4 fans have resorted to after losing 3 gens in a row.

Thanks, I will! Enjoying losing yet another gen Giovela? Irrelevant? The biggest threads here involve GS scores and gfx. PC has your number.

PC has several times the gaming revenue than PS4, not including browser games.

1. EGS Exclusive = Still on PC. I don't see how this is a negative.

2. Twice as much? https://www.dsogaming.com/news/the-witcher-3-pc-vs-ps4-vs-xbox-one-sale-percentages-revealed-for-2015-2016-and-2017/. Not that sales really matter, but you appear to be lying, as usual.

3. Lmao playing multiplats (90% of PS games) on Playstation. Rofl. TW3 was such a disaster on it. Thanks for bringing that up.

You're reaching for anything to throw against PC, but it's too late. It won this gen in landslide. Library, gfx, performance, online, etc.

Stay second place, Console cuck.

That is a very well written piece.

It's crazy how Epic is willing to spend 3 million for a lesser known game like Phoenix Point. It also means the well will drie up someday and they can't keep paying for these kind of exclusives.

Valve was one of the last bastions of PC gaming left, so it's not hard to understand why some people have a really 'religious' loyalty to Steam. Steam was the place that offered a service, that didn't treat you like a piece of shit because others pirate. It kept your games up to date, even more: it allowed you to subscribe to mods and it kept those up to date for you as well. Valve made 0 profit from that. They were free mods.

They did it because they seem to have understood PC gaming.

Something which Epic is lacking. I don't care for the millions they spent, I have so many games now, I can wait a year for their exclusives to appear on Steam again. And for those that I can't wait, like Metro I will find another way like rushing to the steam store to buy that last copy :P

Epic is doing a terrible job, and absolutely terrible job at buying consumer good faith. Strong arming people into using their store, or finding no way around it, is not what Valve did all these years and that is why people are loyal to Steam.

Hey these PC gamers are true freedom fighters!

It's true that Steam has reduced piracy massively thanks to being a good service with regional pricing (even Russia is quite a big market now thanks to Steam - i'm not russian, btw), but will the Epic exclusives ''undo'' it? Ufff... no way. I'll rather wait ~1 year to buy the latest Metro on Steam and they can stick the ''exclusives'' up their own ass. You just make yourself an excuse/feel no guilt to play the game(s) for free, because you feel like being entitled to play the game??? Sweet...?

I can perfectly understand why there's Origin/Uplay/MS Store exclusives, because they are also publishers of their OWN games and want to have a control over their OWN properties.

They don't do forced 3rd party timed or fully fledged exclusives - that's quite the common dirty tactics thing on consoles. I don't want to support that nasty shit on PC, just like i didn't support Microsoft's GFWL back in the day. Was glad to see that ''service'' being completely shutdown by Microsoft. BTW, you can still play the games with that DRM perfectly fine (i do with zero problems), it just uses Xbox profiles after all, so it still keeps you achievements and all of that... You can't only play an online multiplayer, that's all...

The Metro series is huge in Russia and the Ukraine, the Epic Store has horrible region pricing plus transaction fees so that makes the game too expensive for them to buy. This can easily knock a region such as Russia back into pirating because there is no way they're all just gonna sit and wait a year for a Steam release when the game can be pirated right now. Not only that but the Epic Store is blocked in some countries such as China and South Korea so games held exclusive to the Epic Store are cut off from a massive player base. China is another country similar to Russia that was rampant with piracy now being a huge profitable market because of Steam.

I don't think the Epic store will completely undo all the progress Steam has made for the PC gaming industry but it will certainly have a bad impact on games that decide to do the timed exclusivity crap.

If opening up another online game store is suffering then you people need to learn what real suffering is. I mean, wow, really? LOL.

Hermits pirate all their games anyway, so I don't see why they care they don't even need a launcher.

Steam has been awful as a piece of software for pretty much its entire existence. Competition can only be good to get Valve to keep improving it.

This too. Why do they even pretend they pay for anything let alone from an online store?

Oh of course, it isn't just the percentage cut as you rightly pointed out with Discord. It's just a PR thing and to appear as dev focused while try to paint Valve as evil corp. If you notice in almost all the interviews of Epic/Tim and PR they specifically highlight the 30% cut and how that makes Valve such evil. In reality the only reason games are 'exclusive' on Epic store is because Epic is paying the publishers. 30 vs 12 is only a distraction.

Just buy a PS4 and Nintendo Switch. Leave pc gaming in the dust, that’ll show ‘em

@XVision84: But can’t they then refund the game? Would the reviews remain, or do they get “wiped” when the purchase is refunded? (I’m not that familiar with Steam’s refund policy.)

@zmanbarzel: I've never tried it but I'm pretty sure it remains. That's a fair point of contention, however I find it hard to believe that people are mass purchasing full price games just to review them every time a review bomb happens and risk not getting a refund. More likely it's fans who owned the games before. Plus it also shows the number of hours played in their review and the overwhelming majority of review bombs have way more than 2 (threshold for a refund).

I wish these forums had the same "thumbs up" functionality as commenting on stories. Instead, I'll just say it manually: thanks for the info!

No problem :)

I already bought borderlands 3 on PS4 but if I were a PC gamer I'd choose to wait and buy it when it comes out on steam (easier said than done). The difference between the launchers is astounding but if people are willing to switch for whatever reason and to get the game 6 months early despite the epic store being a clearly inferior launcher then what can you do?

If all it took was for developers to get a bigger cut of their revenue then it's pretty obvious how steam can easily reverse the situation. If steam simply matches the cut steam will come out the winner and force epic to go on the offense again. Reminds me of that office episode where Micheal starts a rival paper company and steals clients away from dunder Mifflin by undercutting them. Yeah its clear what your clients will pick but is it sustainable is the real question.

Actually I haven't played Metro, if I do it'll be when it's dirt cheap and on Steam. I bought The Division 2 on Uplay (I buy all Ubisoft games, that I want, from Uplay or Uplay keys). I'll buy Outer Worlds from Microsoft. Epic will never see my money as long as they are anti-consumer, have disturbingly bad security and are strongly suspected of giving customer data to the Chinese government.

Give it a year or so and I'll guarantee that there will be developers who only release their games on Epic complaining about piracy. If they decide not release games on the largest, most lucrative, single platform because of their bad decisions it's their loss.

Just because I know what will come of Epic buying exclusives, doesn't mean I'm pirating games. If I said to someone don't run across the motorway because you'll get hit by a truck, doesn't mean I've been running across motorways.

As I said in my post above, I buy games from Uplay and Origin and I'm even willing to buy games from the awful MS store to avoid Epic.

So much trolling in one thread XD

I'm just going to sleep now.

Anyway, Epic sucks for pushing away reviews, and the lack of localized pricing. If they fix user reviews (no longer opt-in) then I don't have much of a problem with their store. But I still wouldn't expect people to be happy about being forced to buy it on a store with less features. Etc. Etc. You know how this goes.

Well, if Steam could prove to a lot of people that piracy is NOT worth it in the end, then you won't pirate games anymore.
If you feel like you can't miss out on (so far) few games or are too impatient to wait for it to be released elsewhere (only game i actually care about as of now is Metro: Exodus), you then have to shell out the extra money... Am i wrong?